Questions
by Eseelti
Summary: Empress Emily Kaldwin the First had always had many questions, and Corvo had always had many answers. There were, however, questions she dared not ask, in fear of getting a reply.
1. Death, or Justice?

**_Disclaimer: I do not own Dishonored, nor will this suddenly change in any future chapters I might write_**

 _ **My inspiration for this was a Low Chaos, No deaths, Ghost run of Dishonored.**_

* * *

 **Death**

 _On the first anniversary of the death of Jessamine Kaldwin_

They stood at the pavilion, before Her grave, the girl and her protector.

"Corvo?" Emily Kaldwin the First asked in deep thought as she looked out over her city, "Why?"

"what do you mean, my empress?" Corvo Attano replied in a whisper, and turning to gaze at her scarred Lord Protector she elaborated on her question: "Why did you let them live, after all that they did to you? And I do not just mean my kidnappers, but the others too. Nobody died because of you, even if they truly stood in your way of helping me."

"That is a complicated question my lady, and there are several answers to it. But first let me ask you this: would you blame a sword for killing a man, or would you blame the man wielding the sword?" Emily did not see why he asked this question, as it was obvious and seemed to have nothing to do with her own question. She still answered him as she trusted that he would not ask her if it was not important.

"I would blame the man of course, for the sword was just a tool." And as she sat down on the bench nearest her mother's grave, Corvo answered: "And so would I, which is also why I tried my best not to kill any guardsman or civilians, even if they did stand in my way to you. They were just tools that the usurpers wielded, and I could not blame them for doing their job and trying to live the best way they could."

After some consideration, Emily saw. But her next question was plain to her, and it appeared Corvo knew her just as well and anticipated it. "And as for the people who assisted in Her murder and both of your kidnappings: I did not kill them because I feel killing is only rarely an useful option. That is not to say I did not bring Justice to those responsible for Her murder and your kidnapping though." As he explained he walked over to the wall once more, and he looked towards the direction where she knew the Hound Pits Pub was located.

She deeply considered his answer, but found that she could not understand what Corvo meant so she joined him at the wall. The Lord Protector saw her confusion and elaborated: "It is hard to understand, but it is often that living, under different circumstances for each person, is often a worse punishment than being executed for your crime."

"Take Thaddeus Campbell, his entire life was tied up into the Abbey of the Everyman, and everything he valued was in his wealth and comfort. I marked him with the Brand of the Heretic, and his own order cast him out and took everything he lived for. Yet, he still lived a miserable life after that, knowing that what he did to you, your Mother and myself was the cause of his loss."

"Then the Pendleton twins, they had lived a life of nobility and cruelty since birth. Their punishment was to be made mute, and then to work as slaves in their own silver mines, finally experiencing the cruelty they so casually visited upon others."

"The missing Lady Boyle was misguided, as she was truly in love with Hiram Burrows and did everything solely because she truly thought that he did what was best for Dunwall, so she lives in relative comfort. The only punishment for her is that her new life is a gilded cage, as her freedom was taken away from her by a nobleman who also loved her and did not wish to see her come to harm. He traded her safety from the Conspiracy for her freedom."

"Hiram Burrows had good intentions originally, even with the plague, but those good intentions paved the road to the Void for him. For him, every lie he told, every bit of order that he created was destroyed by his own confessions. Now he rests in prison, alone and forgotten, with nobody caring for his manipulations and plans."

"Daud was the man who killed Her, and even before I met him it had already become his undoing. He truly regretted it, and when I found his belongings I found between them several plans to assassinate Burrows and his compatriots, and freeing you, as a sort of repentance. I let him go, to live forever with his regret and even now he still does his best to serve your cause."

"And Farley Havelock, a true man of the sea, was stripped of every honour he ever had. Then he was tossed into my old cell in Coldridge Prison, where he will forever be tortured by the smell of the sea, knowing he will never see it again."

Finally Corvo looked away from the river, and he gazed her in the eyes as he asked: "Do you understand now, my lady?" And Emily Kaldwin the First understood.


	2. Scars

**_Disclaimer: I do not own Dishonored, nor will this suddenly change in any future chapters I might write._**

* * *

 _ **Scars**_

Emily knew Corvo had many scars.

Some she knew the origin of, some she did not, and then there were those she did not even know the existence of. There were scars that he looked fondly on, scars for which he had a grim explanation, scars that held no special story, and then there were the scars he refused to talk about. There were the visible scars, there were scars hidden beneath clothing, and there were scars on his mind.

There were scars from his youth, in warm Serkonos, and he always spoke fondly of those. They were the scars a young child gains while happily growing up. He spoke of falling from a tree, straight into a thorn bush, all in an effort to make a young woman happy by retrieving her hat. He spoke of small burns, earned by trying to help his mother in the kitchen, but instead accidentally messing up dinner. He spoke of helping his cousin with bullies, only to then face the older brothers of those bullies, and losing miserably.

There were scars from before the Murder, from happy times, with both her mother and her younger self. There were scars he earned complying to her younger self's wishes, playing hide and seek or teaching her how to cook, and they always drew one of his rare smiles. He spoke of scars earned while sparring with the guardsmen, keeping both them and himself in shape, while training to protect her mother and her. He did, however, notspeak to her of the scars he earned while saving the lives of her mother and her, just as he would not speak about the assassination attempts she knew must have occurred even during those days.

Then there were the scars, that happened after her mother's murder, those which still pained him. The rat and fish bites on his arms and legs, which sometimes haunted her nightmares, for how easily could he have been infected by the plague. The small electricity burns, from whenever an arc pylon just was not completely powered down yet, or whenever the rewire tool was not applied in completely the correct way. The scars his tools left, from long periods of use, where he gripped them too tight.

Those were just the little scars, the mostly unimportant ones, irrelevant in daily life. There were worse scars, scars which would pain him for the rest of his life, scars which would always be visible. There were the scars on his entire body, but especially those on his throat, from his time in Coldridge prison. Then there were scars on his insides, from the poison served by the Conspiracy, which would forever render him unable to speak loudly without pain. There was one very large electricity burn, from being too close to the special arc pylon made by Piero and Sokolov, which would always painfully pull at his skin.

Worst of all were the scars on his mind, for they haunted his dreams at night, and pained him worse than all other scars put together. They were the ones he never spoke of, but Emily knew him well, and she could guess what they were.

The first was the rat plague, as it was for most citizens of Dunwall, but his worse due to being so close to the core of the events. His personal pain though, lay in his inability to get help from the other nations of the empire, thereby failing her mother.

The second was his failure, his failure of her mother, and his failure of her. Her mother was murdered and he did not stop it. Emily herself was kidnapped and he did not stop it. The criminals got away with it and he did not stop them. He had not seen it coming, he did nothing to stop it, and the true murderers would have gotten away with it had not a small group of people seen through the lies.

The third of the scars on his mind was the loss of her own innocent mind, as he saw it, because of the time she had spent in the Golden Cat. She saw the flinch when they returned to the Hound Pits Pub, and Samuel tried to wave of the work in deposing the usurper Burrows as 'adult business', and she mentioned she had seen a lot of 'adult business' in the Golden Cat.

The fourth existed hand in hand with the fifth, and it was the second time he failed to stop her kidnapping, this time at the hands of trusted friends. They had just repaired his ability to trust, which had been destroyed by Burrows, and became people he saw as true friends. Then they poisoned him, kidnapped her, and shot the others. They became everything they stood against, and he now had to fight against people he previously trusted as friends.

The sixth and seventh were true mysteries to her. She only knew that it had to do with the small box he always kept with him, which could contain something that could fit in his palm, and the man with dark eyes she once saw in a dream.

Emily knew Corvo had many scars.

But the one she wondered most about was the strange one, the one he always kept under a glove, the one on his left hand.

She never dared to ask a question about it.

* * *

Corvo knew Emily had scars.

Some he knew the origin of, some he did not, and then there were those he did not even know the existence of. She had scars that he looked fondly on, scars for which he had a grim explanation, scars that held no special story, and then there were the scars he refused to think much about. There were normal scars, and there were scars on her mind.

There were unimportant scars from before the Murder, from happy times, with both her mother and his younger self. These were scars she earned while playing games, and neither of them found these scars unpleasant, for they evoke happy memories.

Then there were scars on her mind, and these were the important ones to him, for those would pain her for the rest of her lifetime.

The first came from seeing her mother's murder, the second was from the brothel she had to stay in while kidnapped, and the third came from thinking that her protector was murdering the people who harmed her. The fourth came from seeing people who she trusted betray her, the fifth from being ripped away from the body of someone precious to her once again, and the sixth was from thinking him dead.

The seventh he only suspected, from small clues she had given him, of being about the Outsider and the Void.

Corvo knew Emily had scars.

And he knew the thing that bothered her the most, even though she knew not what they were, were The Heart in his pocket and The Mark on his hand.

She never asked a question about it.


End file.
